ResMed S+ Personal Sleep Solution | Review

ResMed S+ Personal Sleep Solution gives you the ability to track record and chart sleep patterns. It gives you a revolutionary way to take control to improve the quality of your sleep by using bio-motion technology.

Key Features

What is ResMed S+?

Flash back to a few years ago. If we tell you that there is a gadget that is capable of monitoring you while you sleep, you’d probably find it ridiculous. Those things would only exist in sci-fi movies. But today, all these technology seems pretty normal. One advancement is this ResMed S+ sleep tracker. Unlike the things we see in sci-fi movie, this sleep tracker won’t do you any harm.

Developers did a good job at exploring activity tracking technology and they actually made it better through the years. This is why there are already a lot of trackers sold in the market and products like fitness trackers and smart watches are considered to have accurate data.

On the other hand, sleep tracking accuracy falls a few steps behind. It mostly measures the physical movement and not the details of how we sleep. ResMed believes that they have found the solution and they are bringing it to the next level. This means that we can forego with all the attachments when we sleep when we try to track our sleep.

The very first questions would be: Does it really work? What types of data does it display? Does it help us have a better night sleep?

Physical Design and Build

Many people will agree that the sleek look of the S+ is awesome. It’s not so tacky and it actually blends well with the things on your bedside table. It is surrounded by metal and the main control center is a shiny white fascia box. It is simple and minimalist. It would have been perfect if not for the power cord attached right at the middle.

The LED indicator at the top part glows red and green. Red means that it is powered on but no phone is connected to it. Green means that your smartphone is within its range and that it is ready to do its job. When you sleep, the light will turn off, leaving you at peace and darkness.

The size of the whole S+ is reasonable. It’s not too big and bulky that it occupies space. It also is heavier so you don’t easily knock it down or accidentally move it.

Sleep Tracking Abilities

S+ uses radio waves for it to start detecting your sleep. This is why it functions without coming in contact with it. This also means that it can function even when there are obstacles between the S+ and you like your covers. Additionally, it is very sensitive enough that it can still continue working even with your sleeping with someone beside you are when you turn to another sleeping position.

When you hit the Sleep button as you prepare to sleep, the Bluetooth-connected smartphone app will ask you a few questions regarding your day. It can range from the stress levels you felt all throughout the day to the things you consumed. After this, you can specify an alarm or put on a calming sound to help you sleep.

App and Data

Technically, the S+ is just one large sensor. So, all your sleep tracking data is stored on the app on your smartphone. On the one hand, it is preferable since you only get to deal with controlling everything on your phone. But, that also means that your phone needs to be connected throughout the night. Also, there is no built-in speaker in the S+ so if you choose to play sounds and alarms it will come from your phone too. This could result to battery drain.

The good thing is that the S+ comes with a dual-USB wall adaptor so you can ensure that the S+ is on and you can also charge your phone at the same time.
In the app, you can see insights and analysis that will help you come up with a sleeping strategy. They might seem overwhelming at first but you will soon get the hang of studying these data.

I received this as a gift from my wife because of my sleep problems. Although it connected with my phone a Galaxy Note 5, it could not record my sleep patterns. I received no feedback from it and at times would disconnect by itself over night. What their product description does not tell you is that it does not work with all smartphones and apparently mine is one of them. That information is in their user manual, unfortunately a little too late.This product may work wonderfully but the product description should have warned people to check whether their phones were compatible with the product.

I’ve been using S+ for over a month and it really is an accurate piece of technology. I do use a CPAP but my sleep patterns have lately been disturbed by some sciatic-like sensations in my feet at night. I will awaken and sometimes have difficulty falling back to sleep. Or, I will have some intense dreams and awaken, only to start analyzing them. I am retired, so catching up on sleep the next day is not a problem, as I can nap at will.You may wonder, as I did, why I would want to monitor my sleep? I was interested in noting how many disruptions I had at night (since it is hard to remember them), and also the amount of REM, deep, and light sleep stages I experience. I have found that by committing myself to a few months of sleep monitoring, that I am more focussed about sleep issues and less stressed by the times when I don’t fall asleep quickly, or remain asleep throughout the entire night.The S+ monitors is a rather neat technological device. It measures room temperature, light and noise levels via some internal sensors. However, to measure sleep levels, it contains a very sensitive motion sensor, and I mean sensitive! If I lightly tap my finger on the mattress, I can see each tap register on the S+ monitor. During the night, the monitor registers the rise and fall of your chest cavity, regardless of your sleeping position. How it knows whether you’re asleep, or experiencing different stages of sleep is part of the technology that Resmed has collected over years of experience.I have normally not had any problems pairing the device to my iPhone SE, which must be done each night. The green led on the monitor will fade out after the session begins. You can also let the monitor play one of several soothing noises to help you sleep. The noise patterns (e.g. waves on the shore) will match your breathing pattern after a few minutes. I find this very relaxing and usually fall asleep within 10 minutes.If, for some reason you need to get out of bed during the night, you don’t have to adjust the monitor. It knows when you have left and returned.Since your phone is paired via Bluetooth to the monitor, it must be on all night. I just plug it into the recharger and wake up with a fully-charged phone in the morning. During a sleep session, the screen of the phone fades to almost complete darkness and doesn’t disturb your sleep.The S+ asks you some simple questions before each sleep session to gauge your caffeine and alcohol intake, exercise and stress levels. I have found that for me, these factors don’t correlate with my sleep quality, but for others they may.Upon waking, I end the sleep session by pressing a button on the app screen. The app will show you your sleep score immediately, and show where you may have had some disruptions or deficiencies in the type of sleep you experienced. Going to their website, you will see more in-depth discussion about sleep factors, and how your sleep varied throughout the night, as well as temperature, noise, and light levels. The data is shared with the Health app on your iPhone. If you have an Apple Watch, there is an S+ app that provides some great color graphs of your sleep history data, brief insights to your sleep patterns, and ‘Relax Daytime’ function that will play a soothing sound through your phone speakers to help you take that afternoon nap you crave. Nice job on the watch app! Resmed will also send your via email, a full report of your sleep history for the prior month.I’m very impressed with Resmed’s dedication to this technology. They have provide me with some useful tips about sleep quality and how my experience matches that of others my age. I’m not sure how long I will be monitoring my sleep, but it really isn’t difficult to do, and I think the data and graphs are interesting to analyze.

I use other ResMed equipment nightly (a CPAP machine) and so far I’m impressed with this unit. I’ve used other sleep monitoring solutions (WakeMate, Fitbit, Garmin Vivofit) and they all required some sort of band or wearing something which can be uncomfortable. This unit sits on my bedside table, is powered via a MicroUSB cable (so I can plug it into my multi-USB-device charger), and connects to my Android tablet via Bluetooth. The first couple nights were a little finicky about getting the unit set to the right distance from the bed, but after that everything has worked great. My only complaint so far is that the software has to keep running on a phone/tablet all night, rather than just syncing with the device at the start and end of a sleep session.